What We Put Things In

For ten years it held the rubber bands,

a Canadian quarter, pens

that stopped working around year four—

whatever I'd set down without deciding.

I cleared the desk. Threw the tin

into recycling. It rang hollow—

too light, that sound, for something

I'd used a decade. I went back.

On its side. No lid. The inside

stained coffee-dark, permanent, from a morning

I can't place—some last cup before the tin

stopped being a coffee tin.

The rubber band still looped around the middle.

The smell still there: not quite coffee,

more what coffee leaves in metal

after enough time.

I stood over the bin.

Went inside. Came back once more.

The tin. The stain. The cold outside.

I couldn't say what I was checking on.